Fury
by Frigonfic
Summary: Johanna Mason's fury was what fueled her on her whole entire life. It was her drive and her determination; her destruction and her downfall. And in the end, when all the anger is seeped out of her, she sees what is really left. Johanna Mason from the Hunger Games that she won to the end of Mockingjay.
1. Unexpected

Thanks for clicking & hopefully reading!

This is going to be a story about Johanna Mason that starts from her Games all the way to the end of Mockingjay. So yes, there are spoilers. It's going to be a bit like a three-shot (does that even make any sense?) since I can't fit everything into a one-shot, and it's too short to be a short series. So I'm going to settle for a three-shot, if such a thing even exists.

This lovely story/three-shot/piece of written work/thing was requested by the amazing duhBekah!

**Disclaimer: Everything belongs to Suzanne Collins.**

* * *

__**fury **[noun]

**1. **destructive rage verging on madness

* * *

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

She always took people by surprise; with her size, with her skill, with her replies.

And she doesn't know how to feel about that; whether to be irritated at the fact that they think so little of her, or to be deviously glad that they underestimate her.

Johanna Mason is more than what you think she is, and she's more than just some tiny little girl who sits at home and waits for the future to come.

She's not like most girls - she climbs up trees and hacks away at the trunks, even though it's considered a man's job. Johanna finds it funny, that they would categorize jobs by gender - all the work they're doing goes to the Capitol anyways.

It's pointless.

Day after day, Johanna works. She cuts down trees with her axe, and she takes satisfaction in hearing the _thud _of the tree as it reverberates into the earth, as if the more trees that fell to her hand, the more the Capitol would shake, so far away.

Johanna hauls the wood to the shops and she continues chopping. She swings her axe at the trees and pretends that every blow is one delivered to the Capitol personally.

One for every child that dies in the Hunger Games.

And one for all the children that will continue to die for their entertainment.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

But despite her hate towards the Capitol, Johanna isn't coated in bitterness.

Only in the forest, where no one can hear her scream. Where the trees fall under her hand, and she feels like she has some sort of control over something.

But back in her little house on the outskirts of District 7, Johanna is a loving sister and a playful cousin. She is a hardworking daughter and a beloved niece.

Every day, Johanna would scurry up the trees before she axed it down, to look for bird's eggs in their nests to bring home to her younger siblings and her little cousins.

Pale, speckled, smooth eggs lie in a row in her house, a collection of little trinkets that she brings home every day. Johanna relishes in seeing the little children squeal in delight over her newest discovery.

And her uncle and aunt that lived with her would boom loudly about what a sweet cousin she is, and her parents would smile at her with a twinkle in their hazel eyes.

Her older sister would roll her eyes, and all the little children would giggle and shriek with glee.

And Johanna would be the reason for it all, the reason for the happiness so commonly found in this little household.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

Johanna's life is more than fine, in her opinion. She has the forest to work in, where she can scream until her lungs feel like they're being torn apart. She has the birds and the trees and leaves to listen to her, and her axe against the tree trunks to rid of the anger she has for the Capitol.

She has her family to come home to; the family that she loves and the family that she would die for.

But this happiness is short-lived, and Johanna curses herself for ever thinking that things would be okay in this world; not with the Capitol ruling them.

When Johanna is fifteen, she is Reaped to participate in the Hunger Games.

She doesn't know what to think, doesn't know what to do; not when it's _her name _that's been drawn out of thousands of slips, and with her family giving out strangled cries all around her.

Johanna sees the look on her older sister's face, so wrought with grief and horror; she would have volunteered for Johanna, she knew it - but she's nineteen now, and Johanna doesn't know if she would rather see Annaleigh walk up to the podium instead of her.

She can see the look on her parent's faces, her aunt and uncle's faces mirroring theirs. They clasp onto each other like they'll never let go, and tears are streaming from their face like waterfalls, looking at her frantically and filled with terror.

And as Johanna walks slowly to the podium, she passes the face of her little brother. Little Declan with his face contorted in anguish, watching as she walked by. It was his first year, his first time being enrolled in the Reapings, and no - he wasn't supposed to see this.

Johanna climbs the stage, and the Capitol escort pushes her up, forcing her to move faster. His touch burns like acid on Johanna's skin, and she wants to hiss at him; he's from the _Capitol._

She doesn't know what to do, standing like fool on the podium, with the cameras trained on her. Johanna can see her little cousins in the children's pen, crying hysterically, almost drowning out the words of the escort.

And all Johanna can see are the faces of her family scattered throughout the crowd, crying as they see her on the stage that announces her as a pig going to the slaughter.

She fumes, because this is the Capitol's fault, and now she will never see her family again and she'll never play with her baby cousins or go to Annaleigh's wedding or tease Declan for having a girlfriend. She'll never find love herself and she'll never have children with a face like her own; she'll never see the forest again and she will never bring home another egg for the children to play with. And it's all the Capitol's fault.

The tears that trickle down her face burn her skin, and Johanna tries to wipe them away, but they're coming too fast.

She'll never hug her parents again. Her aunt and uncle won't give her a praise ever again. No more family dinners and no more late-night talks.

Johanna can't help but to think about all the things she will lose in a matter of weeks, and all the things she'll never have; all thanks to the Capitol.

One tear for every little thing she'll never have, for every little thing she'll miss.

And they're tears of _anger _because this isn't fair, she's not supposed to be up here, she's supposed to go home and stay with her family forever.

Soon, Johanna is a blubbering mess on the stage, not even hearing the boy's name being drawn. She can't see through the tears and the anger that clouds her vision, and she hates herself for crying like a baby, but she hates the Capitol for making her look like this more.

The hate and the loss mixed together is making her cry, and she can't help the tears running down her face or the steaming, bitter hate in her mouth.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't. _

She's pushed into a room, and she sits on the couch, trying to compose herself.

Her family bursts into the room - all of them rushing in, running for her.

None of them can speak through the tears and none of them can do anything but cry.

"Why do you have to go?" Jeremy, her youngest cousin, wailed loudly.

"You'll come back, right?" Rhine, her other cousin pleads, tears shining in her dark green eyes. "Right?"

"You have to." Declan said stubbornly, though his voice trembles.

"Mommy, make Johanna stay!" Livi shouted to her mother. Johanna's aunt only shook her head slowly, shaking silently with tears.

"My baby girl. My beautiful baby girl." Johanna's mother sobs, hugging Johanna tightly. "My little girl."

Annaleigh held her little sister with a viselike grip.

"You'll come back. I know it." She whispered into Johanna's hair, letting a few tears drop onto her hair. "You have to."  
Johanna nods and tries to seal everybody's face into her memory, but the tears in her eyes make everything blurry and she' s left with nothing but a distorted picture of the life she used to have.

"Find water." Her father gasps through his tears. "And stay away from the other tributes."

"You're small, but you're strong." Annaleigh shook Johanna firmly. "Remember that."

"You'll try to come home?" Declan asks Johanna timidly, clutching his older sister's hand like he used to when he was still an innocent boy. "You can't leave us behind."  
"I will. I'll try my best." Johanna chokes out, her throat raw and scratchy from all the tears.

"I love you." Her mother whispered, clutching onto her father's arm tightly.

And all around her, Johanna's family surrounded her, whispering _I love you._

Over and over again, the three words are repeated, floating through the air, carrying bits of Johanna's old life in them, of what she used to have.

_I love you._

Johanna chasing Rhine, Livi, and Jeremy around the house, yelping and screaming with happiness.

_I love you._

Annaleigh and Johanna having long conversations on their bed, planning out the wedding and the family that they both wanted to have, Declan laughing when he walked in on them.

_I love you._

Her parents dancing during celebrations, letting her dance in the middle; her aunt and uncle swaying nearby, smiling.

_I love you._

And in the middle, Johanna cried, the memories hitting her with full force; the faces of the people she'll miss most surrounding her.

"I love you, too."  
_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

**. **

They take her away; whisking her to the Capitol. The tears are streaming down her face the whole time, with the memories fresh like a wound, and the sight of her family being dragged away from her as they cry out her name.

Johanna manages to compose herself a little on the train, but her anger towards the Capitol does not ebb away. _They _took away everything she had, and everything she could ever have.

By the time Johanna is sitting at the table for dinner on the train, she is fuming, despite the fact that her eyes are pink-tinged from all her crying.

The boy sitting next to her stares stonily ahead; a seventeen-year-old, by the looks of it.

Their mentor, Blight, walks in, his footsteps sounding like tree trunks crashing into the earth.

He sits down and eyes his two tributes with weary eyes.

They look the same to him, the same as the last year's tributes and next year's tributes. They're always the same, with scared eyes and hopeless chances.

Johanna stares at Blight, ready to take in whatever knowledge he gives her. She had promised her family that she would win, and Blight was the person who was going to give her all the information she needed to go back home.

But what he says is unexpected and not the least bit helpful at all.

"You," Blight points to Johanna with his bottle, "are a fool."  
Johanna is taken aback, because that was not what she was expecting, not from the person who was supposed to help her survive whatever the Capitol threw at her in a week.

"Crying the whole entire time?" Blight accuses. "In front of all the cameras?"  
Johanna opens her mouth to defend herself, but Blight cuts her off.

"How am I supposed to work with that?" He growls. "Now you definitely won't have any sponsors. You're too weak."

And those two words - _too weak _- struck Johanna like lightning.

Johanna Mason was not weak.

"Before you try to stick up for yourself, honey, I should let you know that the Capitol doesn't like tears." Blight hisses at Johanna. "And neither do I. Tears are for the sniveling cowards who have no chance of winning, and already you've proven that to me."  
Johanna seethes, because she is no coward, and she is not weak. She stands up from the dinner table and leaves without a word, stomping all the way back to the compartment.

No one stops her.

They all thought she was some fool, some _weak _crying fool who couldn't do a thing.

They were wrong. They were all wrong. Johanna Mason was not some prissy, snivelling coward who was pathetic and useless.

She would prove it to them. To all of them.

But why did she have to prove it to them? Johanna didn't have to show the Capitol _anything. _She didn't owe it to them - not after all they did - and she sure wasn't going to try and _impress _them.

Johanna didn't need Blight or the Capitol to win. She was fine all by herself. She didn't need to win over anybody, and she sure as hell didn't want to.

So they saw her as a blubbering dunderhead? Fine. Johanna didn't have to try and change their minds - they had no part in whether or not she was going to win. And she was _going _to win.

She didn't need their help, and she didn't want it. There was no way the filthy Capitol was going to assist her in any way. And never in a thousand years would she accept it.

In fact, she deduced as she rolled over on her bed, it was better this way.

Johanna was already a weakling, another victim to them. They didn't know about her strength or her abilities, and she would play it to her advantage.

It only made her all the deadlier when she unveiled what she could really do.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

**. **

Johanna decides to play her part as the crying buffoon throughout the whole entire train ride.

Blight thought she was weak? She didn't need his help; since when did anyone besides the Careers get sponsors, anyway? There was no use in wasting time and energy trying to charm the Capitol when she could be preparing to _win._

Already, her plan was developing in her mind.

Johanna already created herself in front of Panem as another useless victim who will die. She would continue the part, letting everyone think that she was weak; underestimating her. Nobody would pay attention to her, let alone even think she was competition.

Then, when the time was right, with all of their guards lowered from her reputation, she would take them out and win.

It was perfect. All Johanna had to do was cry and cry and cry.

And that's exactly what she did.

Johanna cried as she left the train. She cried when they gave her the makeover, loud enough for the other tributes to hear her. Johanna even let a few tears trickle down her face during the parade, making sure that she shook and trembled, looking around with fearful eyes.

She cried when they were in the training centre, just sitting in the corner, wailing loudly as the Careers threw their spears and knives. While she cried, or let out the occasional whimper, she observed everyone. Johanna saw the Careers and took note of all of their skills and build, as well as any other tribute she thought was worth observing.

She would cry hysterically whenever a trainer offered her a weapon to practice with, pretending that she was deathly afraid of weapons, when in reality, she was eying the axes in the corner.

Johanna made sure to tie feeble knots and identify plants incorrectly during her judging. She cried during the judging and sniffled quietly the whole way through. Blight shook his head when they saw that she got a 1 on her training score - she's surprised they didn't give her a 0 - but Johanna had a silent celebration in her room when everyone was asleep.

Johanna shook noticeably during the interviews, and spoke softly in a trembling voice, making sure to let her eyes water multiple times. She gave the most fearful replies and wiped her eyes with large motions that everyone was sure to notice.

It was almost too easy to cry on command - Johanna pinched her eyes slightly before entering any public place and thought about all the saddest things she could come up with - her family dying, District 7 being bombed, the forest being reduced to ashes.

But mostly, she thought about the Capitol taking away everything she had, and the angry tears would start up again. As long as no one saw her fists, then it was fine.

By the night before the Games started, Johanna knew that she had succeeded in the first part of her plan.

All of Panem saw her as a fool. As a weakling, completely hopeless and most definitely a bloodbath victim. All of the other tributes saw her as easy prey; pitiful and so pathetic that they wouldn't even bother with her.

Johanna smiled, looking out her window at the world that thought she was a weak coward.

She fooled them all. And now, she was one step closer to returning home to her family.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

**. **

Johanna runs away from the bloodbath, not daring to even grab a knife. She was supposed to be the frail Johanna that was afraid of weapons, and she couldn't betray her act by carrying one.

Johanna ran away and hid herself, staying away from all the tributes.

That year's arena was a construction site. There were half-finished buildings and houses missing their roofs; streets missing their road and apartment missing their walls. Construction vehicles littered the arena; trucks, cranes, bulldozers, forklifts - all of which were frozen in position, in the middle of a gruesome dance.

Everything seemed to creak and sway, ready to fall at any second.

Johanna hid in the tallest apartment, on the fifth level. There was a wall missing, along with the roof of the apartment. The floors were missing a few planks and the ceiling was missing a few beams.

Johanna holed herself in a crack between the walls, feeling the structure swaying slightly.

From the height of the apartment, Johanna could see most of the arena. There was the Cornucopia not too far away, with all the bloody bodies and Careers hacking away. Along the unfinished street she was on, there were a few other half-finished houses and apartments; trucks and cranes at every corner.

If she squinted hard enough, Johanna could see a section of the arena where it was nothing but bulldozed flat land, with what she assumed was a bulldozer nearby.

There were no trees. No grass, no plants, no vegetation. Everything was dust and dirt; brown and grey, the skies bleak and unfriendly.

Johanna hid in her tiny hole in the wall, even as night passed. The Careers passed by her building once, but they quickly bypassed it after seeing how unstable it was; unwilling to take their chances in venturing up. The large boy from District 5 also passed by her apartment and seemed to have camped out in the house across from her.

Johanna stood as still as stone, almost as if she was a part of the structure herself. Night came, and she counted the faces in the sky - fourteen. Johanna almost lets out a laugh when she sees her district partner in the sky - Blight had trained him, and he had tried to charm the Capitol, and what use did that do for him? He was dead by the first day.

Now that night covered the arena, Johanna slipped out of the crack she had been hiding in. Her stomach was rumbling, and her limbs were all creaky and cramping from the countless hours in the cramped space.

Tentatively, Johanna explored the floor she was in, careful not to step on any of the gaps in the floor or any planks that would make squeaks. She didn't dare to go up another floor; in fear of the whole building collapsing her - it was unsteady as it was on the fifth floor - and she didn't dare go down a floor either; the District 5 boy was nearby and she didn't want to risk him seeing her.

Carefully, quietly, Johanna prowls around the fifth floor of the unfinished apartment, looking for any weapons or food - both which were unlikely.

However, Johanna managed to salvage a large, wooden stake that splintered off a floor above and fell to the ground. The ends were sharp, and the wood was strong, and Johanna tucked it into her belt as a weapon to use.

There was no water or food anywhere, and Johanna's stomach was grumbling loudly enough for the boy across the street to hear.

She was almost done doing her third round when she heard slight skittering noises.

She whirled around, gripping her stake tightly.

Staring back at her were a dozen rats, twice as large as they should be; eyes a glowing yellow without any pupil, eerie and disturbing.

Muttations.

They opened their mouths and skittered towards her, and Johanna could see the sharp fangs in their mouths - poisonous, most likely.

The rats charged at her, and Johanna raised her stake, ready to kill.

One by one, Johanna killed all the muttation rats; stabbing the ones closest to her and swinging the ones that got too close away.

Soon, there were twelve bloodied bodies of the dead rats around Johanna, who was holding a bloody stake in her hands, panting.

Johanna smiled sweetly at the camera in the corner, and delighted in imagining Panem's reaction.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

**. **

For the next few weeks, Johanna lives on the rats. She discovers a furnace on the second floor of the apartment and she toasts the rats there. They're crunchy and bitter, but it's better than nothing.

The furnace also leaks water. Occasionally, just a few drops. Johanna uses an empty tin she found to collect the water. It takes hours to get anything more than just a few droplets of water, but in the end, Johanna has enough water to satiate herself for another day.

The Careers killed the District 5 across the street from her. She could hear his screams piercing the night, and her brown eyes shined down from her little crack between the wall.

The Careers entered the apartment she was staying in, as well. She could hear them climbing up the building; on the first floor, the second, the third, the fourth - but when they reached the fifth, Johanna was already out the missing wall and scurrying down the building with the bucket and stake attached to her belt, using the pipes along the side of the building.

When the Careers left the apartment, dissatisfied that they found no one there, Johanna climbed back up again, and she found that climbing up and down the pipe was quite like climbing up and down the trees back at home.

Johanna lived in that tiny apartment floor, stabbing the rats every night and even taking out a few hawk muttations that flew through the unfinished wall. There was the occasional rumble as the building slowly deteriorated; the floors above her shuddering and breaking off, letting it rain sharp splinters.

She hid in the crack between the wall during the day, and came out only at night when no one could see her figure in the building or her brown hair in the wind.

The days passed slowly, dragging on. Faces lit up the sky every night, and Johanna tallied them in her head.

Sixteen down...seventeen...eighteen...

It wasn't until there were only six tributes in the arena did Johanna leave her little apartment for good.

Armed with her stake and a determined glint in her brown eyes, Johanna hunted the arena for the last tributes, ready to go back home, no matter what it took.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

**. **

Johanna found the first tribute - the girl from 3 - huddled on the seat of the crane down the street.

The girl had a knife, and she held it tightly, her knuckles turning white. Her face was gaunt, eyes crazed, her stringy blonde hair hanging in front of her face.

"I-I want to be a-allies." Johanna whimpered, adopting the stutter and quiet tone she used during her interview. She hid her stake behind her back, ready for its access if needed.

The girl did not lower her knife.

"It's too late in the Games for allies." She shook. "Go now, or I'll kill you."  
Johanna widened her eyes in fear and back away quickly, tripping slightly over her shoes.

Even though her eyes were laced with the fear she was so used to faking, Johanna noticed the girl and her fragile state. The way she held onto her knife with both hands, too tightly to unravel in her frenzied state.

It would be unfortunate, really, if someone was to attack her from a distance and she couldn't throw her knife in time; not what that grip in that state.

Johanna took a few more steps back, the girl's panicked grey eyes never leaving her. When Johanna saw the girl let out a small breath of relief, Johanna took her chance.

With lightning speed, Johanna pulled out her stake and threw it at the girl, piercing her through her throat. The poor girl's hands didn't even have enough time to let go of the knife before she fell over, dead.

Her cannon rung, and Johanna pried the knife out of the dead girl's hand, testing out the weight of the weapon in her hand.

Johanna continued hunting for the four remaining tributes, never looking back at the dead girl; her first kill.

Johanna had to go back home, had to go back to her family - she _promised _- and there had to be some sacrifices.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

**. **

One by one, Johanna finds them all.

The boy from 2, the girl from 1, and the girl from 4.

Johanna kills the muttations that they throw at her - hawks with cutting feathers and sharp claws, rats with poisonous fangs and deadly speed, beetles with unbreakable shells and lethal pincers.

She finds the remaining tributes, and all three of them - Careers, they were - all laugh when they see her, the frail, weak, shaking Johanna with a knife in her hand and a grim smile on her face.

"I'll go easy on you, Seven." The boy from 2 smirks. "Just for you and your condition."

Johanna breaks his ribs with her own hands and pins him to the ground, stabbing him in the heart. He's dead in minutes, after a knife fight that he wasn't expecting, barely giving Johanna a few shallow cuts before she kills him.

The boy is in bleeding tatters by the end of it all, and Johanna knows that everyone is watching as she pulls out the knife from his cold body.

"My, my, my. Look at what came tumbling in." The girl from 1 purrs. "Isn't this lovely?"  
Johanna stands as still as stone, watching as the tall brunette picks out a machete with a deadly curve.

"I'll have fun playing with you." She says sweetly, her smile filled with acid.

Johanna breaks both of her wrists and slits her throat, the self-confidant smirk still on the dead girl's face; dead too quickly to process what had happened.

Johanna takes the axe from the dead girl's pile of supplies, along with her food and water. The axe is familiar in her hand, and if she bypasses the cuts on her hands and the body in front of her, she might even fool herself to believe she was back home again.

"Do you honestly think you can kill me?" The girl from 4 laughs, barking. "I'd like to see you try."

Johanna hacks at the girl, despite the girl's best efforts to evade her powerful swings. A large gash rips open in the girl's stomach after Johanna's last blow, like a gruesome smile on her stomach.

The organs come spilling out, and the girl dies before she can get the rest of her pained scream out.

Johanna yanks her axe from the girl's bleeding stomach, wipes the blade of the axe with the dead girl's shirt, and continues on, already looking for her next victim.

She was not the prey.

Johanna Mason was the hunter, and she wouldn't stop until she was the last one alive.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

**. **

The boy from District 1 is her last target.

He's a bulky eighteen year old boy, with at least a decade of experience and a thirst for victory and blood.

Johanna was nothing but a measly fifteen year old with her life spent in anger, fuelling on by her drive to go back home to her family and the life she had.

"Are you going to kill me?" The boy asked, an amused smile on his face. "Little bitty girl from District 7?"

Johanna only grips her axe tighter, staring at the boy and the club in his hands.

"Do you honestly think you can do it?" The boy hisses. "So you can return home to your little hick family by the forest?"

Johanna grits her teeth and her eyes flash with burning hatred when the boy mentions her family like that. But no, she will not be the first to strike. She turns the handle of the axe over and over in her hands, but she will not be the fool and hit first.

"Let me remind you of the odds right now, Seven." The boy grins, a malicious glint in his eyes. "I have fifteen years of training, and you've had absolutely none. I got a ten in training. You got a one."

"I'd say the odds are in my favour right now." The boy laughs to the sky, completely crazed.

Without a warning, the boy snaps his head back to Johanna and charges at her, his club held like a bat, ready to swing at her head.

Johanna ducks and steps nimbly aside, reappearing behind the boy with her axe raised and ready.

The boy growls and charges at her again, swinging for her head, then swinging for her legs when he misses.

Johanna leaps and dodges all of the boy's furious hits, and the boy roars in frustration as Johanna disappears from his sight for the fifth time. She quickly shimmers up the crane next to them, perched between the bars.

"Come out, come out, little girl." The boy calls. "There's no time to hide when I've got a Game to win."

Johanna watches as the big, burly boy spins around in circles looking for her, and she positions her axe. It's too hard to throw her axe down at him, not with the crane's bars in her way.

Without a warning, Johanna leaps down from her post on the crane to the boy's back, the unexpected weight making the boy crumble to the ground.

Johanna raises her axe, ready to deliver the final blow, but the boy keeps on squirming around, quickly turning over to see Johanna on his back. He grabs his club, but before he could even wrap his fingers around the dull weapon, Johanna brings down her axe and hacks off the boy's arm.

The boy roars with pain, the arm lying inches away from the socket, blood pooling from the wound.

Without hesitation, Johanna hacks off his other arm, and his screams intensify, sounding too primal to be human.

Blood pools from underneath him, already forming a large puddle.

Johanna stands up, her feet ankle-deep in the boy's oozing blood, watching as he squirms around, trying to get up without the balance of his arms. She holds the axe in her hand, blood dripping from the blade.

"The odds lie." Johanna spits out, the burning anger of the Capitol underestimating her coursing through her veins.

The boy looks up at her with fearful eyes, the shadow of her body blocking out any dull sunlight. The shining blade of her axe and the vicious look in her deep brown eyes will be the last thing he ever sees.

With one quick, clean slice, Johanna severs the head of the boy from the body, just like how she would sever the trunks of the trees back at home.

The cannon rings, and a shocked voice declares her as the victor.

The hovercraft lifts the boy's remains, and the blood that drips from his wounds falls onto Johanna's head; raining blood from the death that she created.

Johanna is the victor, and she is going to go home.

But looking around her, looking at the abandoned, ghostly construction site and the puddles of blood, Johanna knew that it wouldn't be the same.

She may have fooled everybody, but she couldn't fool herself. She was different now, and she's not the same person she used to be. Johanna knows that the girl who played with her little cousins and climbed up trees for eggs is long gone; dead like the rest of the tributes.

Because none of them ever leave the arena, not really.

But Johanna shrugs off the uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach and prepares herself to be returned back home again, barely believing that she actually did it - she won the Hunger Games and now she was going to go back home and see her family.

The weak, fearful Johanna Mason was this year's victor.

_She's not what you expected, no, she isn't._

* * *

**Thanks for reading!**

So, what did you think? Love it? Hate it? Let me know through a review!

Yes, if you may or may not have noticed, I did write this out a little differently than my other stuff. I usually don't write in third person unless it's for a one-shot (two-shot? three-shot?) and I normally don't have a reoccurring line in the story that appears every now and then. However, I do quite like it for this one-shot, three-shot/thing and I was just going along with it as I wrote. I really only did this once for another story of mine, so I'm wondering if you guys like it for this story.

I kind of wrote this in the middle of the night - funny how inspiration strikes at the strangest of times. So I apologize if there are a bunch of errors in here, with a ton of characters just kind of thrown at you and just nothing making sense at all. So yes, basically I am apologizing for writing out a bunch of gibberish and posting it up. Sorry ):

And, if you haven't known about it already, I have a little challenge of mine in which I write backstories for existing characters in the Hunger Games series. Often, I just write whenever the inspiration sparks for whatever random character I'm thinking about, but I do also take requests! If there's a character you'd like for me to write about, then just let me know through a review or a private message, and I'll be sure to write out your request (:

Once again, thanks for reading!


	2. Unfair

__Thanks for clicking & hopefully reading!

The second segment to the Johanna three-shot! I know there are like a million names and characters that kind of just pop up everywhere without explaining who exactly they are and how they're in relation to Johanna. Sorry about that; I tried to explain them all whenever I could but I didn't want to keep repeating them all, so I trust that you have everyone's names down? If not, here is a list/legend for you guys to refer to if you're confused:

Annaleigh = Johanna's older sister, Declan = Johanna's younger brother, Rhine = Johanna's little cousin, Livi = Johanna's little cousin, Jeremy = Johanna's little cousin

Yes, it's quite sad when there's a legend for all the characters... sorry. Really. I tried to keep it to a minimum, but I really couldn't resist, and it all just came out like a character bomb in your face, with me just kind of throwing characters at you. Oops.

Anyways, not to delay you any longer! I hope you enjoy the chapter!

**Disclaimer: Everything belongs to Suzanne Collins.**

* * *

_No, this isn't fair, this isn't right; this is all wrong._

She was done playing their games.

Johanna Mason had won the Hunger Games, and she got what she wanted - to go back home to her family.

And she was supposed to be happy; she has her family and this new big house to fit them all in and enough food to feed them all for the rest of her life.

But Johanna isn't happy. She isn't happy at all.

Not when her family has fear and sadness in their eyes, trying to hide it with their big smiles and fake laughter.

Not when everyone in her district runs away from her, looking back at her with terror and whispering whenever she passed by.

Johanna isn't happy, not at all. She's absolutely miserable, because everything's different now, everyone treats her differently now.

Her little cousins don't play with her anymore - Jeremy, Rhine and Livi scuttle to the corner whenever she enters a room - _I'm scared, Rhine, I didn't know she could do that with an axe_. _I'm scared, too, Livi, what if we become like her when we grow up? Be quiet, Jeremy, she's coming! _

Her older sister doesn't want to have the long talks on their bed anymore - _I'm busy, Jo, can't you see_ - and Johanna can see the fright in Annaleigh's warm brown eyes whenever she looks at her.

Her younger brother is always looking avoiding her eye, and Johanna overheard Declan talking to his friend the other day - _I don't know who she is anymore; I swear I'm nothing like her._

Johanna hates it, hates the worried glances her parents cast her, or the sad little smiles her aunt and uncle give her.

She used to be what made her whole family smile and laugh. And now - now, she was what gave her parents grief and horror; the reason for the panic in their eyes and the sadness in their smiles.

And Johanna wants to blame the Capitol - and she does, well, a little bit, anyways - but Johanna knows that some of the blame goes to her. For killing the tributes in that manner. For labeling herself as deceptive and sly.

But she had to come home, she had to do whatever it took, and why can no one see that she is just a girl who did what she could to return back to her family?

Didn't they make her promise? Didn't they tell her to do anything it took to come back home?

That's what she did. She did what she could, and she fooled them all, and it worked, and she won. She's home. So why is everybody looking at her like she did something wrong when she only did what they told her to?

So Johanna wanders into the forest for hours and hours - days, even - and stays there. Stays away from her family and their uncomfortable actions with her. Stays away from her own district that hated her, feared her.

Johanna finds a haven among the leaves and green and steady trunks, and she screams and howls like the animal she's become. She kicks and punches and scratches the trunks, feral, and her nails rip away, blood on her hands.

It reminds her only of the blood that spattered onto her body as she killed the tributes, of the droplets of blood dripping onto her hair, of the puddle of the boy's blood that she stood in when they announced her as the winner.

And Johanna screams and cries in the forest, where no one can hear her, cursing the Capitol for taking away everything she had even after she thought she had won.

_No, this isn't fair, this isn't right; this is all wrong._

Johanna Mason was just a little fifteen year old who had enough anger to burn down the Capitol. But no, she was more rational then that; she knew better than to go and try and take down the Capitol herself, even with all that they did to her.

But she still had her anger. So she took it out on herself, scratching away layers of skin, biting deep into her bones, shredding away at herself.

Johanna Mason - the animal that was Johanna Mason when she won the Hunger Games - was destructive. And when she couldn't destroy others, destroy the ones she hated; she destroyed herself.

She went on a rampage, curling up on the forest ground, bleeding. She threw rocks at trees and swung her axe at the trunks, howling to the wind and crying with the rain. Johanna stomped into her home and gathered all the eggs she had every collected for her little cousins and crushed each and every single one of them in her fist, satisfying in the way the juice dribbled from her hand.

But it wasn't enough. It wasn't ever enough. Nothing would put out the anger she had for the Capitol - she was supposed to have a happy life with her family and she was never supposed to have killed with her bare hands and _no, this wasn't fair, this isn't right; this is all wrong._

But even though Johanna's hate for the Capitol burned endlessly, the hate she held for herself completely consumed her.

She hated how she killed the children. She hated imaging their parents watching as she killed their children. She hated the blood that she couldn't wash off her hands. She hated seeing their eyes in her nightmares, and hearing their screams throughout the day.

Johanna hated how _she _caused all of this, caused her family to tear apart and caused families across Panem to fall to pieces. She hated how her little brother didn't have any friends because of her, and how Johanna could never tease Declan for having a girlfriend now. She hated how her older sister's boyfriend left her after he saw Johanna kill those children, and Johanna hated how she couldn't comfort Annaleigh at night while she cried because Annaleigh didn't want to see her anymore.

Johanna's rage and hate consumed her from the inside out, and it coursed through her veins like blood; like the blood of the tributes before she killed them.

There was nothing she could do to put out this anger and this hate. Not when she bled or cried or screamed.

Johanna seized the kitchen scissors and locked herself in her washroom, staring at the reflection in the mirror.

The girl in the reflection had bloodshot eyes filled with loathing and misery. Her long, chestnut brown hair lay in dirty strands, covering her face; the girl's face waxen and sunken.

Johanna lifted the scissors to her head, glaring at the reflection in the mirror, as if daring the girl looking back to do it.

Johanna grabbed a handful of hair and slowly closed the scissors over it. The long brown strands fell to the floor lightly, tickling her toes.

She cut each fistful of hair slowly, tears pricking the back of her eyes, watching as the long brown tresses wafted to the floor.

She cut until the hair was too short for her scissors to reach, and she was left standing in her bathroom, surrounded by her brown locks of hair on the floor.

The tears started flowing, despite her best attempts to stop them.

Her head felt lighter, but the weight on her heart did not.

In fact, as if it was making up for the weight her hair used to have on her head, all the thoughts and possibilities came rushing into her head, making Johanna sink down in her grief.

_That girl had a little brother at home that only she could tuck to sleep._

_That boy was the only reason why their parents kept on waking up every morning to this world._

_That girl had a best friend whose older sister died in the Hunger Games, too._

All the possibilities, the scenarios, came flooding into Johanna's head, and there was nothing she could do to stop them from coming. Johanna curled up in the corner of the washroom and cried, the tears sliding silently down her cheeks, making no sound.

The children and their hopes and dreams. Their future and their family. Their friends and their memories.

Johanna took them all away when she killed them, and she couldn't handle it, couldn't handle the weight of this burden that they placed onto her shoulder when they put the victor's crown on her head.

So she cried and cried in the corner of her bathroom, because that was the only thing she seemed capable of doing.

_This isn't fair, this isn't right; all of this is wrong._

**. **

Johanna hated the Victory Tour.

She hated going to the districts, seeing the faces looking up at her with disgust and loathing for what she did. She hated seeing the family and friends of the people that she killed, and she hated watching them celebrate her arrival like she was some sort of celebrity worth worshipping.

And every night, every district, every second - it reminded her being back in that dusty arena with blood on her fingers and a weapon in her hands.

Johanna hated the parties and she hated the stupid Capitol citizens with their stupid pills. She didn't want to join in on the festivities, and they might force her participate, but they can't force her to have a good time.

And there was no way in hell that Johanna Mason was going to celebrate what she did.

She didn't know what was wrong with this world, not when all these people were celebrating the deaths of twenty-three innocent children and the making of monster for one. Johanna didn't know why these people liked watching others die and laughed when they squirmed.

It wasn't human - these people weren't human at all - and they were all revolting and disgusting.

And the worst part was that Johanna was their newest idol.

_This isn't fair, this isn't right; all of this is wrong._

**. **

As if Johanna didn't hold enough repulsion for the Capitol and its ways, she is introduced to another one of their sick forms of entertainment by President Snow when she turns sixteen.

And she tried, god, she _tried _to do it for her family.

But she couldn't.

The way he grabbed her, the very way his skin touched hers made her sick. From the tattoos on his face to her unnatural luminescence of his bright yellow eyes; the way he pushed her forcefully to him and the way he _looked _at her.

Johanna couldn't do it, couldn't handle it.

And it wasn't because she didn't love her family - she loved them despite their glances and fear - but her anger and repulsion took over her. She _hated _the Capitol, hated everything they did, hated everything they made her do - and she couldn't sit still and let one of them kiss her and take advantage of her.

No, Johanna Mason couldn't do that; couldn't kiss someone who loved watching her kill, and dishonour her family and district and just repay all the dead tributes by turning into one of the people that sent them to their deaths.

So Johanna broke out of the man's horrific grasp, ran to the train station and took the first train back to District 7.

But when she rushed to her home in Victor's Village, she was greeted by a stony cold silence.

Peacekeepers, everywhere in her house. Standing in a straight line, blocking her view of everything.

Before Johanna could do anything, or even open her mouth to question what was going on, four Peacekeepers grabbed her. She fought and kicked and bit, but the Peacekeepers had iron grips and they held her down like they were trained to.

They shackled her to a chair, her hands and feet chained to the legs and arms of the uncomfortable wooden chair.

Johanna screamed and yelled and protested, but the Peacekeepers ignored her, continuing in their robotic movements, not looking human at all.

Johanna screamed and shouted, until they brought out her aunt and uncle. The both of them were shackled and gagged, terror in their eyes.

All the screeches and curses died in Johanna's throat when they slit their throats.

Their bodies fell down, heads knocking together, the chains clanging. The blood seeped into their white, new carpet, staining it red.

Johanna could only open her mouth, only to have no words come out.

Her aunt and uncle, who always praised her for being such a sweet, hardworking girl. Dead, so easily. They loved their children and they loved her and Declan and Annaleigh just like they were one of their own.

Dead. Gone. Lying in a puddle of their own blood. Just like that District 1 boy when Johanna killed him. The Peacekeepers slit their throats just like how Johanna did to that District 1 girl.

The Peacekeepers dragged the bodies back into the room that they came out off, leaving a trail of sticky blood behind them. Somewhere in the house, a door slammed shut, and Johanna could hear screaming.

_Mommy! Mommy! _

_Oh god, no, no, get them out, please, the children shouldn't be seeing this!_

Johanna could hear the children's loud wailing and sobs, crying hysterically. She could hear Rhine's loud screams and Livi's heartbreaking sobs and Jeremy's wails.

The Peacekeepers returned, this time with Johanna's father.

"No, please, no, stop!" Johanna screamed hysterically. "I'll do it, please, don't, I'll do anything, _please _-"

The tears were pouring down her face now, and she could barely see through the tears.

"No, please, _daddy, _I'll do it, I'll do it, just stop -"

But the Peacekeepers didn't listen, and they did what they were here to do.

Slowly, agonizingly slow, they killed Johanna's father, slicing through his skin and bones with the kitchen knife. His blood poured onto the floor, and his cries escaped his mouth, despite his attempts to hold them in.

Johanna watched, watched as her father crumbled to the ground, watched as he died in front of her, watched as he took his last breath.

_I love you, Jo, and you'll always be my little girl. Please don't cry._

Johanna sat, chained to the chair, watching as they brought down her family one by one, killing them in a new way, listening to the screams of her remaining relatives as they dumped the bodies in the same room.

They dipped her mother in the bubbling pot of acid that they took out, and she was nothing but dry bones with skin hanging off by the end of it.

_I'm sorry mommy, I'm sorry, this is all my fault and I'm sorry that everything's my fault._

Johanna watched as her mother's smooth skin peeled away, as her brown eyes, pink with tears, widened in horror as she reached closer and closer to the bottom of the pot. Johanna watched as her mother's face contorted in agony, inhumane screams of pain leaving her lips.

_Don't be sorry my little bird, we all make mistakes. I love you, and I'll love you forever. _

They brought down Annaleigh next, and Johanna could hear her sister's struggles as they tried to drag her down to the living room. But the Peacekeepers overpowered Johanna's older sister, and Johanna was forced to watch as they beat her with the lamp and the fireplace poker and the chair.

_No, please, stop - I'm sorry Lei, I'm so sorry, I never meant for this to happen and now you'll never get married._

She was nothing but a bloody pulp by the end of it, purple and black bruises covering her soft skin, tears falling uncontrollably from the eyes that used to be so warm, her brown tresses coated in blood.

_It's not your fault, Jo, and I'm sorry for avoiding you. You're the best sister I could ever have._

Livi, drowned in a bucket of water, her little six-year-old body thrashing as they held her head underwater, her screams and cries coming out as gurgles.

_STOP, stop, stop, don't do this - she's only six years old, she doesn't deserve it, please, take it out on me. _

Her body was lying on the floor, strands of honey brown hair framing her sweet face, bloated and puffed with the water in her body.

_What are you doing, no, stop, I don't like this, I want mommy and daddy, stop, no -_

Little Rhine with tears still falling from her eyes as they wrapped their large hands around her throat and squeezed, her small pink mouth open in a silent scream, a gasp for air.

_No, I'll do it, I'll do anything, please, not her, she's barely nine years old, I'll do anything you ask of me for the rest of my life._

Her skin was a sickly grey, her hazel eyes staring into space, never even seeing the day she would turn ten years old.

And no, Johanna screamed and cried and pleaded as they brought down her family, one by one, for hours and hours, until there was nobody left. They tortured the last of her family and they made her watch.

She watched as Declan cried out in agony when they broke all of his bones, howling in pain.

_I love you, sis, I'm so proud to be able to say I'm your little brother._

She watched as they killed her youngest cousin, Jeremy, watching as his little four-year-old body twitched and spasm after they force-fed him poison.

_What are they doing, Jo? I don't like this, is this just a game? This isn't fun, Jo! Make it stop!_

And when the sun rose, the Peacekeepers finally unlocked her from the chair she was chained to and left the house, leaving Johanna all by herself in her large house with nine dead bodies.

They scattered their bodies into every room, leaving blood trails everywhere. Everywhere Johanna looked, she saw the dead body of another person she loved or the blood of the family that loved her, too.

As the sun rose, Johanna fell.

Johanna collapsed onto the floor, crying the tears that had been flowing from her eyes ever since the night started. She saw blood on her hands, and she screamed, not knowing whose body it belonged to.

She couldn't do it, and her weakness caused her family the sentence of death. Johanna's one moment of weakness and pride cost her whole family their lives, and it was her fault.

If only she put her anger aside. If only she bottled her hate and disgust.

If only Johanna Mason was stronger.

But she wasn't, she wasn't strong at all, and she was a liar and a fool for ever thinking she was.

Her family stared back at her with judging, hateful, empty eyes, and their screams and cries echoed in her ears.

The house, which had been a few hours ago, a symphony of screams and cries and pleads, was deathly silent.

And in Johanna's opinion, that made it all the worse.

She crumbled as the weight of the blame and burden and truth collapsed onto her shoulder; knowing that it was completely her fault that anyone she loved - anyone she could _ever _love was dead.

_This isn't fair, this isn't right; this is all wrong._

**. **

"I told you the consequences of refusing my offer, Johanna." President Snow said, without even looking up.

Johanna didn't know what she was doing there, in the President's office. She had to do _something, _she couldn't just sit in her bloody, broken home and do nothing. But she didn't know what made her go to the Capitol, let alone demand an audience for President Snow.

It was hard for her not to kill him in that moment.

"Did you think that I wouldn't do it?" President Snow asked, his ice-blue eyes boring into her hard brown ones. "Did you think that you were a special exception to my request?"

Johanna stood as still as stone, tight lipped and glaring daggers at the man who ruined her family - who ruined so many families - trying to control herself from killing him.

"You are a fool, Johanna Mason." President Snow smiled wickedly. "Your strength is admirable, but your own stupid actions are the only things to blame in this situation."

Johanna curled and uncurled her fists, her fingernails drawing blood. She gnashed her teeth together and listened to them grate; she couldn't kill him now, despite the fact that every fibre of her wanted to - there were guards everywhere, and Snow was smarter than to let an angry victor into his office without a defense plan.

"And though I have thoroughly enjoyed your pleasant stay here in my office," President Snow says, "I must ask you to leave, Johanna. As President of Panem, I'm sure you'll understand that I am a very busy man."

Johanna didn't move, only continued scowling at him, imagining all the different ways she could kill the man in front of her. And Johanna knew that his death would be the one she felt no regret, no guilt, no grief, no sorrow for.

"You should go home, Johanna." He smiles cruelly. "Perhaps you should spend some more quality time with your family - you did win the Games for them, no?"

Johanna hissed underneath her breath, and willed herself to be strong - or as strong as she could be in this state.

"I'll celebrate the day you die." Johanna says, her voice shaking with anger and fury, glaring at him.

And without another word, Johanna left the Capitol and boarded the train back to District 7, back to her empty home, to the grief and the guilt that weighed her down.

_This isn't fair, this isn't right; this is all wrong._

**. **

Johanna lived in the forest.

She couldn't stand being that house, not even after she buried the bodies and cleaned the blood away.

Not when she could still see the faces of the people she loved and killed. Not when she could still feel the blood on the floor when she walked, or heard the screams in the rooms.

Johanna retreated to the forest and slept underneath the stars, only returning to the empty home for food.

Johanna mentored the Games, and she did a terrible job of it.

She couldn't think straight when she was at the Capitol, and she couldn't stand seeing the kids train and fight. Johanna couldn't see past her blinding anger and the advice she gave was bad, and she knew it.

The other mentors looked at her with pity in their eyes - news traveled fast amongst them about the offer - and Johanna hated the pity almost as much as she hated herself and the Capitol.

She refused to speak to anybody, victor or citizen - and she watched her tributes die, year after year.

"Maybe you should try a little harder next year." Finnick Odair, one of the mentors for District 4 suggested after her second tribute died in the bloodbath.

Johanna was already sick and tired, and being at the Capitol did not improve her mood. The last thing she needed was Finnick Odair - the Capitol's icon and _golden boy _- to try and give her advice on what to do.

"I'm doing the best I can." She hisses underneath her breath.

"It's just a suggestion."

"Do you think," Johanna says venomously, "that just because you're the Capitol's golden boy, everything you do is perfect and amazing? The last time I checked, nobody from District 4 won ever since your half-assed victory."

Finnick did not back away from the seething victor's brown eyes, nor did he flinch when she snapped at him. Instead, he stood tall and looming over her, with patience and no intent of moving, making Johanna hate him even more.

Finnick stared back down at this furious victor, at the eyes that held pain like his own, at her haphazardly shorn brown hair, at the slight trembling in her lips.

"The Capitol broke us all, Johanna." Finnick said softly. "There is no winning."

And Finnick left Johanna staring, speechless.

Once again, Johanna remembered Snow's offer, and how he mentioned that other victors were given the same proposition. How stupid was she to not piece it together - Finnick Odair obviously took the offer and went through with it, unlike her.

Through her hate for him, Johanna could not help but to admire the strength that Finnick Odair had to follow through with the deal; the strength that Johanna could never have.

He said that there was no winning.

And Johanna knew that either path they were given was one filled with hopelessness, leading only to destruction. Nobody won against the Capitol, no matter what they did.

_This isn't fair, this isn't right; this is all wrong._

**.**

The memories hit her like a bomb, exploding when she least expects it.

The dinner table, when Declan would make silly faces and Rhine and Livi would laugh, Jeremy trying to do the same. Her mother would smile and chastise them, and the whole family would laugh.

Early in the morning, when Annaleigh would kiss her cheek before going out to work at the paper mill; watching her aunt and uncle carve as she waited for her dad to walk her to the forest.

They hit Johanna, and every single time a happy memory resurfaced, a terrible one would quickly follow.

Her mother's skin sizzling as it peeled off, the sound of Declan's bones breaking; the _thud _of the bodies and the pleads that fell to deaf ears as it echoed throughout the house.

Johanna would remember the strangest details throughout random periods of the day; the exact shade of Jeremy's eyes, the dimple of Livi's left cheek, her aunt's whistling. They hit her like bullets, all the little things that she'll miss.

Annaleigh's ticks, Rhine's freckles, her father's callused hands, Declan's snores.

And in her nightmares, they all came back.

Their dead bodies, strung up and marching towards her, looking like they did when they just died - her mother's bones and unseeing eyes, the pale grey of Rhine's skin, the gaping hole in her uncle's throat. They marched towards Johanna, and she couldn't run away or turn away from their soulless eyes.

They spoke in an eerie, monotone voice, saying the same words over and over again.

_All your fault._

And Johanna would see the Capitol man reaching for her, the tributes pleading for mercy, the blood on her axe, President Snow's ice blue eyes.

The giggles turned to wails, the laughter into screams, and the playful shrieks into pleads. The sweet, charming smile on Jeremy's smile turned into the cavernous gash on the District 4 girl's stomach. The gold in Livi's hair merged into the lustful neon yellow eyes of the Capitol citizen, hissing at her.

Her mother. Her father. Her aunt and uncle, and her three little cousins. Her older sister and her younger brother. The five tributes that she killed.

All of them, they died because of her.

They haunt her in her nightmares, and Johanna gets a restless sleep - opting to not fall asleep at all. The only time she even managed to sleep was when her body completely shut down, needing sleep desperately.

And even in the day, Johanna could see them all. Their screams surrounded her, and they came for her.

She couldn't erase them from her memory, and she couldn't forget their last moments before they died. The anguish and loss and hate pressed down on her, until she couldn't breathe.

The only way Johanna knew she was still breathing and alive was when she screamed, trying to rid her head of _everything, _of all that she's done in her life.

She wishes she never existed. She wished she never lived.

Johanna Mason spent her days in the forest, in bitterness and rage, screaming questions and wishes and curses to the trees and the wind, but no one ever replied.

_This isn't fair, this isn't right; this is all wrong._

* * *

**Thanks for reading!**

Yes, I'm at it again with the reoccurring line, but with a different reoccurring line, if that makes any sense. I figured, if I did it to the first chapter, then I might as well do it for the next two. I hope you guys don't mind the weirdness of it all.

So yes, lots of Johanna angst in this chapter! What do you think about it? Again, I know, there are a bunch of characters, but they will be appearing in the next chapter as well, so it'd probably be best if you got them all down. Sorry ): And I know I kind of extended it quite a bit with the Peacekeepers-killing-Johanna's-family part, so I apologize for that, too. I couldn't really stop myself from trying to describe everything. Sorry!

Anyways, if you have any suggestions, feedback, comments, or questions, please feel free to leave it as a review! They are always appreciated and welcome and of course, it's nice to know that you're reading.


	3. Unable

__Thanks for clicking & hopefully reading!

So this is the third and last section of this Johanna three-shot. It goes through Catching Fire and Mockingjay, so if you haven't read that yet, I suggest you do that now. And yes, all of the characters from the past two chapters will also be appearing in this chapter as well, so if you think that you don't quite remember some of the names, I suggest that you guys go back and re-read the past chapters to refresh your memory.

I hope you guys enjoy this chapter!

**Disclaimer: Everything belongs to Suzanne Collins.**

* * *

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore. _

Johanna had been putting on a brave face for the past six years, hiding everything with a glare and a scowl.

She cried at night, and screamed into her pillow, punching and kicking what she could. But no, she outgrew that. She stopped trying to hurt others when she knew the only person deserving of pain was herself.

She was the reason why they were all dead; why she was alone tonight, why no one will ever love her.

And Johanna Mason didn't let anybody love her - even when they somehow could - because she was still afraid that Snow's punishment was withholding, and the second someone loved her and she loved them back, Snow would kill them.

And Johanna couldn't handle that, couldn't handle seeing another death of someone she loved in front of her. It was bad enough, seeing her whole family in her nightmares every night; she didn't need to add another person to her list.

It was so much easier to push people away.

It was for everyone's own good; Johanna didn't have to grow close to anybody, and nobody got hurt. Johanna didn't have to cause anyone pain, and nobody died.

So Johanna glared at whoever looked at her and insulted anyone who tried to speak to her, because the farther she pushed them away, the safer they would be. She was the sullen, bitter victor, and she was fine being known as that.

Nobody knew that Johanna cried when she slept, or held back whimpers during her nightmares. She was the remorseful, sarcastic victor - to the other victors and to all of Panem.

And once again, Johanna Mason fooled them all.

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore._

**. **

Johanna thought she did quite a good job of keeping people away, and whenever someone stepped into a room, they immediately scurried in the opposite direction from her.

It was because they knew what she did, so crystal clear in their minds even after six years. It was because of the aura she gave off; her anger for the Capitol radiating from the very pores of her skin.

But one person, one person seemed to not get the message and approached her anyways.

Finnick Odair was the most irritating person Johanna ever met.

And it was for multiple reasons. He came closer when she wanted him to stay away. He talked to her when she wanted to be alone. He smiled and grinned in that infuriating manner; he teased and bothered her when she didn't want him to.

He had the strength to carry on Snow's deal when she didn't.

And Johanna supposed that she hated Finnick - she always insulted him and cut him with her words, occasionally physically assaulting him as well - but deep down, Johanna knew that she didn't hate Finnick.

Yes, his self-confidant smirk always sent her over the edge, and his mildly suggestive jokes made her want to axe him. He always stuck around her and never, _ever _left, especially when she wanted him to.

But Johanna secretly enjoyed Finnick's presence - despite the fact that he was constantly tap-dancing on her nerves. She both liked and hated how he kept her company, and how he always stuck by her even through her most bitter days.

Johanna delighted in his presence - though she wouldn't admit to him, his head was big enough - because then, with him around, she didn't feel so alone. She wasn't so afraid.

But at the same time, Johanna was absolutely terrified of spending time with Finnick. He was dangerously close to becoming her friend - even though the very word seemed foreign to Johanna - and she was afraid that Snow would kill him because of the offer she broke. She was afraid that as soon as anyone got close to her, got through her tough exterior, Snow would kill them - and Finnick was inching closer and closer to that point.

But Johanna talked herself out of it - there was no way President Snow would kill Finnick Odair, the most popular victor - President Snow needed what Finnick had been forced to offer.

Johanna knew what Finnick did, and she saw how it broke him. She could see the haunted look in his eyes and the downward tug of his lips. They were both hiding what they felt, what the weight of the path they chose was doing to them.

Johanna knew, that through it all, they were the same.

The both of them were trying to fool Panem, but they couldn't fool each other and they couldn't fool themselves.

_She's alone and she's afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore._

**. **

Johanna was more than willing to join in on the rebellion.

She heard it first from Finnick. Then Haymitch, the victor from District 12, asked her to join.

She agreed. Anything to burn down the Capitol, anything to see Snow die. Possibly at her hand.

So Johanna planned and agreed and she protected, and she did what she was told to even when she didn't want to do it.

But whenever Johanna did something for the rebellion that she didn't want to do, she remembered Snow's stone-cold eyes and her family dead on the floor. She remembered the life she used to have, and the life she could have had.

Johanna remembered what the Capitol took away from her, what they made her into, and that anger and fury drove her on, and it was what kept her going.

Johanna watched over the kids that Haymitch called the 'key to the rebellion'. She despised how Katniss brooded and thought she had it bad, being forced to marry the boy who would love her forever, being forced to be the lover of someone that loved her back.

Johanna hated Katniss, the Girl on Fire, the Mockingjay, the symbol of rebellion. She wanted to scream and hit Katniss, because Johanna knew, Johanna _knew _that what Katniss had was _good, _it was _perfect, _it was the life that Johanna herself wished she had when she came back home from the Games.

And Katniss Everdeen was just another whiny teenage girl who didn't appreciate all that she had. Johanna hated her for that. She didn't understand all the little things that she had, that Johanna wished she could have. How could Katniss be so _blind _to not even notice how the other victors were dealt much worse fates? Why couldn't she just _cooperate _and do what she was told?

But then Johanna remembered the purple and black bruises on her older sister's body as Annaleigh whimpered before she died. She remembered the screams of the children and the cries of the adults, and she remembered what the Capitol did. Johanna focused all of her anger and wiped away the tears when nobody was watching, and she stood tall as she was Reaped a second time and protected the Katniss Everdeen that she hated; even brought her Nuts and Volts like she was told.

Johanna didn't sleep at all - she always got nightmares when she slept, and she wasn't going to give the Capitol the satisfaction of seeing her scream and thrash around. Johanna killed Cashmere without hesitation, and she did it for the rebellion.

For the rebellion. For revenge.

She was _not _doing it because she liked Katniss, or because she wanted to protect her alliance. She did it because she had to get her anger out, and because she wanted to see the Capitol fall.

And when Finnick and Katniss were winded and broken after hearing the screams of the ones they loved from the jabberjays, Johanna felt nothing. She saw how the two of them gave up, saw the haunted look on their eyes when they heard their loved ones in pain.

And Johanna hated it, hated it because she felt nothing, _nothing _and she would rather feel that pain and know that at least there was somebody out there for her to love than to feel nothing at all.

_They can't hurt me. I'm not like the rest of you. There's no one left I love._

But Johanna's lying again, she's fooling them all again.

It's a lie, it's a lie, and Johanna Mason is a liar and a weak fool.

Because when Johanna walks into the forest of jabberjays and sees the birds perched on the branches, they open their mouths and no sound comes out; that, _that _was the worse torture that could be inflicted.

They sing, the _damned birds _sing the sound of guilt and grief, one only Johanna can hear and understand.

No sound comes out of their mouths, but Johanna can hear the screams loud and clear in her head. She doesn't have to imagine what they're doing because she already saw it all, and she already knows that it's all her fault. She can hear the screams coming out of the birds even though no one else can; little Jeremy's wails, her brother's pleas, her father's screams.

When Johanna's done collecting Katniss' arrows, she's winded and furious, holding in her anger and tears. She doesn't have her axe with her, and she can't strangle the little birds herself - _they strangled Rhine, remember the way she struggled for air? _- so Johanna focuses on trying to hold it together in front of the cameras.

Johanna turns back to check for any more missing arrows, and all the jabberjays are staring at her, mouths still open in a silent song.

And the deathly silence only reminds Johanna of her stupid mistake, her own pride and weakness; of the blood on the floors, of the screams and the deaths and the loneliness and pain and grief and the burden and guilt.

The silence of the jabberjays affect her more than they ever could with Finnick or Katniss.

_She's alone and she's afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore. _

**. **

Johanna Mason may be a guilty murder, a broken girl, a sad liar, and a weak fool, but if there is one thing Johanna Mason is not, it is a snitch.

They torture her, in all the ways they could possibly could.

_Tell me what the rebels are planning._

And Johanna would stare into President Snow's ice-blue eyes and remember her promise of celebrating the day he died. She knew it would be soon, it would be so, so soon and all she had to do was tough it out just a little longer.

_Why don't you try a little harder to get the answer from me, Snow? Isn't that the reason why I'm here?_

And Johanna knows that she's practically asking for more pain and torture, but it doesn't matter because as soon as the words left her lips, Snow's lips pursed tightly, and the frustration and anger in his eyes were the balm to Johanna's wounds.

For days and days and weeks, Johanna is tortured. She is thrown back into her cell, bleeding and broken, but every day, she pulls herself and sits up, mustering the strength to glare at the guards; her last act of defiance.

She might open her mouth to scream, to scream like she used to scream in the forest, but her lips are zipped to the rebel's secrets.

Johanna lies in a pool of her own blood, and through her cuts and wounds and gashes, she smiles.

She imagines her family looking down on her, knowing that she got what she deserved. She imagines seeing the dead tributes laughing as she squirmed, watching their murderer suffer.

And in a strange, sadistic, insane way, Johanna enjoyed her torture because she knew she deserved it.

But then they throw her into a pool of water and hold her down, attaching these wires and circuits to her skin that she can't pry off, and then they shock her and no, she doesn't like it, doesn't like it at all.

Johanna coughs out water and screams, but her screams are only bubbles floating to the surface. They turn on the shocks with a high voltage - as high as it gets without killing her - and underwater, Johanna can feel a thousand bugs crawling on her, under her skin, bolts zapping her organs, stinging her, twisting her, burning her.

She twitches and screams and spasms and convulses, and the world around her is nothing but water and yellow and black, and sometimes she sees electric blue snakes in the water and blood dissolving.

Johanna screams and screams, until the water chokes her lungs, frying her more. She can feel her skin shrivelling, exploding, frying, burning, all at once.

And this is worse, worse than hitting her, worse than cutting or whipping or anything else they've done. They electrocute her underwater, and she comes up crying every time.

Johanna can't handle it, can't handle her body deteriorating and convulsing, breaking again and again only to be put back together like some gruesome experiment.

As they shock her, Johanna can see everyone again.

When the electric shocks knock all the lights away, the darkness becomes the black in Annaleigh's bruises, pulsing and bleeding, beating to a horrible song. The yellow that Johanna sees in her eyes turns into the Capitol's man yellow eyes, staring at her.

Johanna can see the blood dissolving into the water, and somewhere above her, Johanna can see her father and uncle and aunt's body floating, turning the water red. She can feel ants and shocks in her mouth, and Jeremy's voice rings out in her head - _this isn't fun anymore, make it stop!_

They dunk her again and again, and each time, Johanna sees something new.

The burning smell of her own skin reminds her of her mother's; her brown eyes widened in fear. The dots that cloud her vision becomes Rhine's freckles, turning into blood that ran down her eyes like tears as she pleaded for air. And little Livi would come floating towards Johanna, her small hands reaching for her, her hazel eyes haunted as her honey-brown hair wafted around her.

_It's not so fun being drowned, now is it?_

Johanna would screech and howl and sob, answering to the voices that haunted her for six years.

_No, it's all my fault, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. _

And they continued with the shocks, because President Snow knew how much this hurt Johanna, knew how much this broke her to pieces.

They threw Johanna back into her cell, and she would lie in the corner, crying, soaking wet, bleeding with the feeling of the shocks underneath her skin.

She couldn't be strong, couldn't pretend anymore - not when she was being tortured, not when they were doing everything they could to break her.

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore. _

**. **

It's all fine and dandy when she's back to District 13.

The rebellion's going as planned, Finnick and Annie get married, and there's celebrations and drinks and happiness in the air.

But over the years, Johanna has become allergic to happiness; she can't stand it. She attends the wedding, and she wishes her friend the best - _can't stop the inevitable, now, can we? _- even though she didn't want to.

She knows now, looking back at her life, Johanna's life was comprised of doing things she didn't want to do. And the one thing she refused to do was the one thing that led to a train reaction of horrors. She had learned her lesson; to suck up the pain and the anger and the hurt and to just do it.

And maybe watching Finnick get married was one of the hardest things to do.

Because Johanna was letting go of her only friend, the one person who understood her bitterness and pain and felt it too, and she was letting him go to an eternal life of happiness and bliss while she sat, watching, still drenched in bitterness.

Finnick and Johanna bonded through their pain, and they knew that the paths they had chosen led to the same destruction, to the same hopelessness as the other.

But now, no, that wasn't true anymore. Not when Finnick was marrying the love of his life. Finnick's sacrifice had paid off, all his years of pain and heartbreak led up to this moment of happiness when he would be joined to the person that he loved.

But Johanna? She would always be stuck in that hate and anger. The path that she chose didn't have a happy ending like Finnick's; all the years of guilt and tears and suffering lead up to _nothing _and now Johanna had to watch as Finnick got the happy ending he worked for while she sat and wasted her life away.

It's just a punch to the face, really, seeing Finnick happy. And Johanna knows that she's a terrible friend for wishing for his sadness, for her own selfish reasons, but Johanna can't help what she feels. She never could.

Sitting through Finnick and Annie's wedding ceremony only reminded her of Annaleigh and how she was supposed to marry that boy, and how so many years ago, Johanna thought that she was going to get married, too. It was a reminder of what she could have had, but of what she didn't.

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore._

**. **

Katniss isn't the whiny brat Johanna first took her for.

When Johanna realized that Katniss actually loved Peeta back, well, her opinion of her raised.

And so did her hate, because at least Katniss had somebody to love.

But Katniss extended a hand of friendship to Johanna, and she realized that the two of them were quite the same in personality.

They gave Johanna morphling on the first few days, but they cut off her supply when they realized how addicted she was to it.

Johanna wasn't a morphling addict before, but she was now. She loved the way the morphling made her brain fuzzy and hazy, and how the nightmares didn't come to her when she fell into a morphling-induced sleep. The morphling clouded her memories and the visions and screams, and it was bliss. Nothing screaming in her head, no bloody memory blooming in her mind. It was nothing but sweet, pure, blank bliss.

And through the addictive drug, Johanna knew it was bad. It was bad if emptiness was something she loved.

But they took away her supply of morphling, and all the pain and memories and screams came back to her in a full blast. The shocks crawled under her skin again, and the visions exploded through her eyes.

So she went to Katniss Everdeen, because the Mockingjay had all the morphling she wanted - _needed _- and Johanna figured that Katniss didn't need the morphling as much as she did.

Johanna went and took the drug from Katniss, and it healed the pain that she felt, taking everything away.

But she supposed, that the best cure of all was when Katniss offered her the unsteady hand of friendship. That was the one thing that the morphling couldn't give her - company.

The scene of her family dying plagued her mind, and her recent trip to the Capitol didn't make things any better. Finnick's happiness certainly didn't help anything, either - she knew that he didn't mean to do it, but it felt like he was rubbing it in her face.

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore._

**. **

Johanna and Katniss trained, and the two of them focused their anger and hurt into learning.

Johanna was grateful, so, so grateful for Katniss' hand of companionship. Katniss let her stay in her compartment, and kept her company when she was alone.

And she didn't irritate Johanna - in fact, Katniss reminded her of herself, and Johanna was determined to not let Katniss turn into what she is now.

But still, despite the training and the meals with people who somewhat cared about her, Johanna couldn't get rid of the visions.

The nightmares came, without the morphling to erase them. Johanna would thrash around, but she never let another tear fall - the water reminded her too much of the pool at the Capitol and the shocks and she can still feel the electricity in her skin and on her mouth.

Johanna knew she had a problem, the way she couldn't even look at water the same way again.

She couldn't, not when the shocks on her skin prickled whenever she saw water. It was as if the shocks were calling for the water, and she couldn't let herself get near it, or else the shocks will just explode again, along with all the terrible visions.

And Johanna was afraid of that. She was afraid of seeing her family in that manner, of feeling the electricity coursing through her like an intruder in her body.

So when it rained and the shocks in her skin screamed with joy, Johanna's heart beat faster. She had to go out and run, with Katniss nagging her to and the training requiring her to do so.

But the rain beat down, like drumbeat, a mating call to the electricity still in her. Her skin prickled and Johanna could already feel the electric shocks starting up in her body.

She couldn't hide her weakness, couldn't hide her fears any longer; she wasn't fooling anyone with her act anymore.

But Johanna steeled herself and ran in the rain, and the electric shocks screamed and flashed through her body like currents.

And for the first time in a long time, Johanna felt strong again.

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore._

**.**

It's stupid, really.

Johanna was a rebel - she always was. She was one of the victors who stayed up late at night with Plutarch to work out the details of the rebellion, and one of the victors who protected Katniss Everdeen in the arena. She underwent _torture _and yet she didn't let a single word slip, and Johanna Mason had rightfully earned her spot as a part of the official rebel team.

But she wasn't.

Johanna and Katniss did the training and caught up, and their final test was one to see whether or not they would be accepted into the official rebel squad.

Johanna wasn't nervous, not at all - she knew she was a rebel, and she was ready and prepared to fight. She went into the simulation confidant.

But she came out in pieces.

They flooded the streets. The flooded the _goddamn _streets.

And they watched, they _watched _as she screamed and pleaded and tried to run away, but water is something she can't run away from, and neither are her visions.

She could feel it, the electric shocks on her skin all over again. She was back at the Capitol, with her head submerged and the voltage on high. Johanna could hear Snow laughing and the electricity ripped through her and tore her apart all over again.

Johanna saw Annaleigh's body floating towards her, her mother's bones below her. Her father's dead corpse smiled, his arms falling off. Her aunt whistled through her slit throat, and her uncle sang along. Declan's bones jutted out at strange angles, his smile all wrong.

Johanna tried to run, tried to scream, tried to swim away, but her three little cousins came at her like torpedoes and held her down.

Livi and Jeremy held her hands down, Jeremy's mouth shriveled and black with the poison. Livi's honey-brown hair reached out for her like tentacles, her bloated six-year-old face staring back at her with blank eyes.

Rhine was in the middle, her little nine-year-old hands wrapped around Johanna's throat. Johanna could see every freckle on her face, the glassy hazel orbs centimeters from her own.

Johanna couldn't breathe, couldn't breathe, there was no air as Rhine squeezed her little hands, her fingers holding too much strength, clamping around her neck.

"I want to play a game, Jo." Rhine whispered, bubbles coming out of her lips, but Johanna heard her words crystal clear. "One where you lose."

Then the three of them laughed, high and shrill, unnatural. The freckles on Rhine's face turned into ants, the dimple on Livi's left cheek into a gaping hole, the missing tooth in Jeremy's shriveled mouth turning into a muttation rat, like the one in her arena.

Johanna fought, she fought but she couldn't hurt her little cousins - not even this state, she had hurt them enough - and she finally found air.

As soon as her head was above the surface, she screamed and screamed at the top of her lungs, unable to stop.

The rebels carried her away as she thrashed and screamed, her whole family still staring at her with those unnerving, glassy, unblinking eyes.

And through the closed doors, Johanna could still hear their words.

_We can play another day._

**. **

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore._

Johanna Mason can't hide her fear and her pain anymore, not when they completely flood the streets and expect her to fight.

She's shaking, she's crying because she can still feel the electric shocks on her skin, can still hear her aunt's haunting whistling tune, can still see Annaleigh with her bruised and beaten skin, so unlike her beautiful older sister.

People visit her and try to get her to calm down, but it's no use, no use, because everything reminds her of the people she killed.

Haymitch and her uncle had the same deep, gruff voice.

Finnick's green eyes were the exact same shade as Declan's favourite colour.

Boggs had the same callused hands as her father.

And it was impossible, impossible for Johanna to forget her family floating towards her, waiting for her death, watching her suffer.

She was just getting well, she was just starting to feel better - she had run in the rain and she sat at meals with her friends - and now she can't even _think _about water and her friends reminded her of the death of her family.

Blood on the tiles. Crashes of bodies. Screams of children.

And why, _why _would the rebels do this? Johanna did as they asked. She did what she was told to do, and though her enthusiasm wasn't the highest, she completed the task. Why would the rebels purposely do something like that, practically bring her back to the Capitol?  
Were they really any better than the Capitol?

She lay, huddled in the corner, trying to forget everything, trying to erase the sight of her mother's bones clicking towards her, skin still hanging off the remains.

They give her drugs - not morphling, they know better than to give her that - and the drugs make Johanna sleepy and tired.

But Johanna fights, she fights as much as she can against these drugs. She doesn't want to fall asleep, doesn't want to go to the land of her nightmares and play the game her family wants her lose. She doesn't want to see them again, she doesn't want to see them die or hear their screams and _she doesn't want to._

They give her these sleeping drugs anyways, and to Johanna, it's like an aftermath of flooding the streets. The rebels were trying to break her, just like the Capitol.

Well, she wasn't going down without a fight - and Johanna fights the drugs and fights the rebels, because she can't stand just sitting and thinking about everything that plagues her mind.

Katniss comes in, and before Johanna can even open her mouth, Katniss thrusts something into Johanna's face.

She doesn't know what it is, doesn't know what Katniss wants her to do. She's so sick of people telling her to do things, when it only benefits others and leaves her for the worse.

But Katniss asks Johanna to sniff whatever it is she made for her drawer - _it's empty, just like your house, just like your heart _- and Johanna does, she'll do this last order, this last command, if it means Katniss will leave her alone.

So Johanna takes a sniff of the bundle, and the tears immediately spring to her eyes. It smiles like the pine trees in the forest, of the days when she was just a little girl who swung her axe at the trees. It smelled of District 7 and Johanna didn't realize how much she missed it.

_Smells like home._

Home. Home, her little house on the edge of the forest, where it was cramped and small but cozy. Home in the trees, where it was her haven and her escape. Home with her family at dinner, home with the steady lull of the trees.

And in that moment, Johanna didn't mind Katniss' presence at all.

She looked up at the Mockingjay, at the girl she hated now because she realized Katniss was so much like her; at the girl who gave her a place to stay and gave her a reminder of home, of what she was fighting for.

_You have to kill him._

And Johanna knows that she's not strong enough to kill Snow herself, not like this. She's brutal and brash and irrational, but she knows that Katniss can. She can kill him.

Katniss _needs _to kill Snow.

For her. For all the children. For all the families. For the starving districts and the broken victors.

President Snow needs to die, and Johanna needs to make sure Katniss kills him.

After all, Johanna needs something to look forward to.

She still needs to celebrate the day Snow dies.

_She's alone and afraid, and no, she's not able to hide it anymore._

**. **

Johanna does celebrate the day Snow dies, and she howls in delight as she watches him fall. Watches him twitch. Watches him die.

But it's a grim celebration, because the fall of their cruel leader had a cost - many rebels died in the process of this rebellion.

Including Finnick.

And Johanna's distraught, she's locking herself in her room again and screaming into pillows because it's _all her fault._

She shouldn't have let Finnick get close to her, because everybody who does dies. Finnick was her friend through those six years of suffering, and he was her companion when nobody else was. Finnick was Johanna's one _friend _and now he was dead, and it was all because of her.

Snow's offer stood.

She should have been stronger, should have sucked up the pain and went through with the flooded simulation and went to the Capitol and protected him.

He had a family, and he was going to have a child - _god, _Annie's pregnant and insane and he's not here - and Johanna had nobody and no one and she was the one who should have died.

How many times has she evaded death? Johanna should have died at her first Hunger Games. She should have died instead of her family. She should have died during the Quarter Quell. She should have been the one who died instead of Finnick.

He was a better person than her. He had a heart, and now he had a family. Johanna was an animal and she had nobody, but somehow, she was alive and he was dead.

All of these innocent people died when really, Johanna should of been the one who died.

And it takes days, weeks, months of therapy and visits to the doctors before Johanna is allowed to go back to District 7 without someone constantly watching her.

But even though Johanna is wrought with grief and guilt and fear, and even though Johanna Mason is a weak excuse of a girl, there is one thing she can still do.

Johanna Mason can still fool others, and she fooled her doctors into believing she was fine, that she moved on, when really, the weight of her past was drowning her in the pool as she waited for the electric shocks to come.

She lies down in the forest for hours, waiting.

She doesn't know what she's waiting for. Salvation? Death? Hope?

But while everyone slowly moves on with their lives after the rebellion, Johanna is tied down to her past. She can still remember everybody, remember their names and faces and quirks and deaths, and she doesn't let go of them.

She doesn't want to let go of them.

Because even though they haunt her, even though they make her scream and cry, she holds on desperately to the people that were long gone in her life. She can't bring herself to make a new life, when all she wanted was her old one. She can't bring herself to forget the guilt and shame, to forget what she did and what she caused.

The faces, the corpses - though she wouldn't admit it - they were the only things in her life that filled the empty hole. She was nothing, nobody, no one, and the only thing that had any substance in her life were the all too real nightmares.

Johanna Mason's only company was the ghosts in her mind.

_She's not what you expected, not the girl she pretends to be._

And slowly, she slips away, slips into the trees, the only place that she knew she belonged.

_It's all wrong, but it's all fair; this is the punishment for the crime._

And her family welcomes her with open arms, smiles rightfully placed on their faces, not a wound in sight. They're all there, all forgiving, all loving - even Finnick - and they greet Johanna with the laughter that she's forgotten.

_She's not alone and afraid anymore; there's nothing to hide, not with all that she's ever wanted around her._

* * *

**Thanks for reading!**

So yes, this is the last chapter of this three-shot! I hope you guys liked it! This chapter was definitely my favourite to write. What do you think about it?

If there is any character from the Hunger Games trilogy that you would like me to write a one-shot about (and who knows - it might even spiral to a short series) then please let me know through a review or through a private message. I'll be doing any request you give, and I'd love to see what you guys would like me to write about next!

Thank you once again to the lovely duhBekah for requesting a story about Johanna Mason, which is how this three-shot came to be!

If you have any questions, comments, suggestions, or feedback, please feel free to leave it as a review! Reviews are more than welcome and definitely appreciated!


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